Hey, thanks for visiting my blog! My name is Kimberly and I live in the lovely, flat land of Central Illinois. My husband and I have one child named Jasper. I get the lucky job of a stay-at-home mom and own a photography business.
I love photography, a clean house, meeting new people, coffee, paper, my fireplace in the winter, dance parties in my pajamas, all things Christmas, almost every kind of music, my hot husband and amazing kid. I hate squirrels, road trips, not having my cell phone on me, and dead batteries.
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Last night my town’s library had a book sale so my mom and I headed up there to check it out. Ok, it’s probably not the best time for me to be buying books but it’s hard to pass them up when they’re a quarter!
I found Dr. Spock’s child care book from 1976. I most definitely bought it. I also got an old kid’s craft book, a couple magazines and a few random books. My dollar was well spent!
You know I love Etsy. I got these two prints before we even bought our red couch. Once we decided on red, I knew these would be perfect in the living room. Both prints are by Studio Mela and I pretty much love everything in that shop. I have so much artwork favorited on Etsy. If I didn’t have a budget and had the wall space to hang it all, I would just keep buying.
When Josh and I bought our red couch I had the hardest time deciding what other color(s) I would use in the living room. I finally decided my accent color would be gray. Not dark dreary gray, but rather a soft light gray. Do you think I can find some coordinating pillows? Not so much. I’ve been looking in the stores but haven’t had much luck. Now if I wanted to have red as my accent color, I would have SO much to chose from.
I did a little online shopping and found a few that I liked but nothing that was exactly want I wanted. Plus I have a hard time buying a pillow online since you can’t squish it and see how comfortable it is.
Granite Pillow, Branch – Sorry, I can’t justify spending $188 on a couch pillow.
grid pillow, CB2 – Too dark
Inhabit Pussy Willows, Mod Livin’ – I really like the design but the colors aren’t quite right.
Weave Throw Pillow, Wrapables – Probably my favorite of them all…
I’m going to keep looking. I would really like something that is a little unique, not just a solid color. I don’t think it’s asking that much to find a nice gray couch pillow, is it?
At one point in time, I would have sworn that I was addicted to chap stick. Throughout high school, I constantly would have a Lip Smacker tube in my pocket. I have since tried practically every type of lip balm and lip gloss I come across. There was the inevitable Burt’s Bees period and the time that I kept buying the different kinds of Blistex… I guess I’m somewhat of a lip balm connoisseur.
Before Christmas I ran across a new company called Rose Petal Betty. Of course, I had to try the lip balm, called Pucker Paste. I thought it would be a nice add-on to a few gifts so I ordered eight.
When they arrived I picked the Ginger Peach flavor for myself. I liked it so much that I kept a couple other flavors for myself. (Even Josh wanted one. He chose the Mint Julep flavor.) The texture is good, the flavor/smell is not too strong, it doesn’t make my lips sticky and it actually helps with chapped lips (some don’t!). I would definitely recommend these!
In my effort to buy handmade this holiday season, I have spent A LOT of time on Etsy. I have favorited so many items and shops that it’s a bit out of control. I thought I would share the wealth a bit. Some items I favorited recently:
Encircle Sterling Silver Circle Necklace – DreamsandJewelry.etsy.com (And pretty much most of the jewelry in that store!)
Celebrate with Circles Clutch – daphnenen.etsy.com
Square Wood Tree Pendant – garnishhome.etsy.com
Luna Earrings -ElisabethSpace.etsy.com
Letterpress Calendar – ilee.etsy.com
Agapanthus Canvas Bag – stevester.etsy.com
Some of my favorite sellers:
luxedeluxe.etsy.com Unique jewelry
stringofblue.etsy.com Really interesting and pretty jewelry
raedunn.etsy.com I’m in love with the pour pitcher.
cipolla.etsy.com Seriously, those scarves with the bird on it…
littlellama.etsy.com There is something about those earrings.
seasprayblue.etsy.com Would be perfect on my art wall.
matteart.etsy.com I LOVE these prints!
moop.etsy.com I can’t even begin to tell you how much I want one of their “Market Bag”. Seriously, I look at them once a week. Obsessed much?
dkim.etsy.com More great artwork.
AliciaBock.etsy.com Cool photography
oneblackbird.etsy.com If I was a piece of pottery, I’d want to look like this.
foundling.etsy.com More very cool jewelry
indulgelaughcreate.etsy.com Check out my new Internet friend, Abbey‘s shop!
That should you keep you busy for awhile. If you’re looking for something in particular and want some help finding it, I might just have it favorited!
I can get very attached to pieces of clothing. I still have my very first EIU hoodie that I got as a freshman in college. It has seen better days but I don’t know that I can ever get rid of it. I like to keep things around that have worked well for me.
Josh ordered those shoes for me two years ago. They were replacements for another pair of favorites that Bebo chewed up as a puppy. I probably wear these at least once a week. And now after two years of frequent use, they are falling apart. Josh threatened to throw them away the other night and I almost had a heartache. (The same thing happened with the pair that Bebo chewed up.) I guess I should be on a quest for a replacement pair.
You’d think I’d be happy about that….buying new shoes. But these are so comfortable! And cute! And functional… Darnit. I guess I’ll admit that they are getting kind of worn out. I think I just have a hard time letting go…even with shoes.
It’s official. I have a cold. It’s pretty much the worst timing because this is my biggest photo shoot weekend. I have two on Saturday and three on Sunday. Hopefully the cold won’t get any worse!
In other news, I definitely started my Christmas shopping. Man, I love browsing Etsy and picking things out. Although all the time I have spent on Etsy has been difficult…it’s so hard not to buy things for myself. My favorites are out of control!! It’s going to be weird to pretty much completely shop online this year. It will be fun to go to the mall when it gets close to Christmas just to walk around. I love this time of year.
I really love gift giving. If I was incredibly wealthy I would spend my days buying things for other people. I love the process of finding that perfect item for someone. The other day I started thinking about Christmas. I even started a list of who I will need to buy for and some ideas. It’s a sickness really. I just get so excited!
I had an idea that this year I would try to buy as much off of Etsy as I could. I love the idea of supporting artists. Then yesterday I ran across the website, Buy Handmade. I love it. Such a great idea…obviously. (I made the pledge and added the tag over to the left.)
Now I’m totally in the shopping mode and ready to start Christmas shopping!
Some resources:
Etsy
Modish
The Sampler
poppytalk handmade
Knight Light had taken Saturday off so Josh and I went up to Ikea. We hadn’t been since April when we shopped for our bedroom. Although we weren’t getting anything major, we really wanted to look at certain pieces of furniture for the living room. Everything always looks different in person so we had to check it out to plan out the room. I had a list of items and we pretty much agreed on everything.
Josh and I always have a good time shopping together because we typically like the same type of things. Our big purchase on Saturday was five picture frames. As photographers, we should really have some of our work framed! Now I just don’t know how I’ll decide what to put in the others.
Last week was a long one for Josh and I. Thursday we randomly decided to duck out of work early on Friday and take a little drive to Tanner’s Apple Orchard. Josh has been begging for an apple pie and I’ve been in need of some good apple cider. So we decided it would be a perfect afternoon trip. We had such a good time wandering around. There is a lot to do if you have little kids like a huge play area. We mostly just shopped for apple-related goods, but we did get to pet some goats.
We left Tanners with 1/4 peck of Jonathan apples for Josh’s pie, 1/4 peck of Honeycrisp apples because they are awesome, a gallon of apple cider, a quart of applesauce, blueberry preserves, a huge mum for my mum and 4 apple turnovers (one of which didn’t make it out of the parking lot). It was such a good afternoon!
